I give an account of ecology’s subject matter and generalizations in terms of functional roles. Functional roles are functionally defined kinds which include multiple species or general abiotic factors as members and occur in generalizations which hold across different ecological systems. Functional roles include central objects of study in ecology, like predator, parasite, and producer. I use functional roles to interpret and reorient major controversies in philosophy of ecology, including the metaphysics of ecological systems and the concept of “function.”

The momentum dispersion model for flows in isotropic porous media has been validated and successfully applied by Rao & Jin (2022, J. Fluid Mech., vol. 937, A17). However, the anisotropic coupled models concerning heat–fluid–solid interactions in turbulent forced convection requires further development. This research proposes various anisotropic physical coefficient tensors to model the total drag ${R}_{i}$, interphase energy resistance $H$, momentum dispersion and thermal dispersion accounting for both anisotropic and isotropic scenarios. The effective physical coefficients of the Darcy–Forchheimer equation regarding ${R}_{i}$ are adapted to accommodate anisotropy. The heat transfer coefficient $h$ between the solid and fluid, despite being a scalar, is also required to depend on the local flow direction in anisotropic cases. Two scaling laws of $h$ with respect to a local Reynolds number ${\textit{Re}_{K}}$ are found: $h\sim \textit{Re}_K^2$ for the Darcy regime, and $h\sim \textit{Re}_{K}^{1/2}$ for the Forchheimer regime, with a transition at ${\textit{Re}_{K}}\sim 1$. The influence of momentum and thermal dispersions, along with the modelling errors of ${R}_{i}$ and $H$ originating from heterogeneity, are approximated using a second-order pseudo-stress tensor and a pseudo-flux vector, respectively. The effective viscosity and thermal diffusivity tensors are simplified into longitudinal and transverse components using tensor symmetries, and are assumed to rely mainly on another local Reynolds number ${\textit{Re}_{d}}$. Both components of the effective viscosity are positive in isotropic cases, whereas the longitudinal component may be negative in anisotropic cases, mainly serving as a compensation of overestimated drag. The coupled models are applied to simulate turbulent forced thermal convection in porous media with one or two length scales across a wide range of Reynolds numbers. The comparisons with direct numerical simulations results imply that the coupled macroscopic models can accurately predict not only statistically stationary distributions but also real-time changes in velocity and temperature.

Presidents are often viewed as national policy leaders. Yet, they increasingly use negative rhetoric to attack the opposition rather than forge legislative compromise, contrary to theories of going public. Why? I argue presidents facing congressional obstruction eschew short-term policy persuasion. They speak as negative partisans to mobilize co-partisans and shape the longer-term balance of power in Congress, improving future policy-making prospects. I collect all presidential speeches delivered between 1933 and 2024 and use transformer methods to measure how often, and how negatively, presidents reference the out-party. They do so when the policy-making environment is unfavorable: when majorities are tenuous, government is divided, and as elections approach. I provide additional support with a case study of Democrats’ 2009 filibuster-proof Senate majority. Finally, this rhetoric has behavioral impact: presidential negative partisanship decreases co-partisan approval of the opposition. This research alters our understanding of going public and reinforces the partisan dimension of modern presidential representation.

This study uses electropalatography to examine linguopalatal contact differences between Japanese geminate and singleton consonants of various lingual places and manners of articulation. The analysis of over 8,000 tokens of these consonants produced by five Japanese speakers in three sets of stimuli (varying by the word lexical status, contrastive focus, and position within an utterance) showed significantly stronger constrictions for geminates of all places and manners, except for alveolopalatal fricatives. The geminate-singleton differences were the largest for alveolar and alveolopalatal nasals, while being the smallest for alveolopalatal affricates and velar stops. Durational differences between geminates and singletons were quite robust and tended to positively correlate with linguopalatal contact differences for most geminate and singleton consonants. No clear contact or durational differences were observed across the datasets, suggesting that the realization of the contrast is affected minimally by lexical status and position in the utterance. The findings for Japanese geminates are further discussed in the context of articulatory studies of similar contrasts in other languages.

The study of vowel quality has traditionally been based on single-point formant frequency measurements. There is considerable evidence now acknowledging spectral change as an essential part of the vowel system. Previous descriptions of Singapore English vowels have generally been impressionistic, with few offering detailed analysis of vowel quality and based on single-point formant frequency measurements at that. Collectively, they converge on the observations that the target monophthong pairs /i, ɪ/, /u, ʊ/, /ɔ, ɒ/, /ɑ, ʌ/, /æ, ɛ/ and /ɜ, ə/ are each realized as conflated single vowel sounds and the target diphthongs /ɛi/, /ɛə/ and /oʊ/ are monophthongized, with some overlap with the monophthongs listed above. This study analyzes the inherent spectral change of Singapore English vowels based on a dataset from the National Speech Corpus and examines possible contrast in duration between its tense-lax vowel pairs with the aim of providing an update on the description of its vowel system. Contrary to past conclusions, the present study finds no clear conflation of the monophthong pairs /i, ɪ/, /u, ʊ/, /ɔ, ɒ/, /ɑ, ʌ/ and /ɜ, ə/, or the reduction of /ɛə/. However, results do show the conflation of /æ/ and /ɛ/, and the monophthongization of /ɛi/ and /oʊ/.

The “Concession to Avicenna,” also known as the seventh chapter of De substantia orbis, is one of Averroes’s several philosophical attempts to reconcile between the corporeality of the celestial bodies and their eternity. The “Concession” contains a brief and rare nod of approval to Avicenna, which prompted the title under which it circulated. The work, lost in Arabic, survives in Ṭodros Ṭodrosi’s Hebrew translation from 1340, from which Abraham de Balmes’s subsequent Latin translation was made in the early sixteenth century. The present contribution offers, for the first time, an edition of the text in Hebrew and its original Latin translation (before its editorial revision for the 1525 editio princeps), alongside an introduction, a philosophical analysis of the argument, an English translation, and a glossary.

With a growing body of research exploring how employees perceive and respond to human resource management (HRM) practices, the strategic HRM field faces the challenge of assessing how insights have evolved and which theoretical perspectives have shaped them. This study presents a bibliometric review of 292 empirical research on employee perceptions of HRM practices, focusing on (1) the major research interests explored, (2) the theoretical perspectives applied, and (3) their evolution over the last 25 years. The analysis reveals a reoccurring emphasis on performance-oriented variables, such as engagement, suggesting a tendency to rely on quantifiable outcomes while sidelining alternative constructs like employee well-being. It also highlights the dominance of a limited set of theoretical perspectives commonly applied, with alternative perspectives remaining underutilised. By mapping how topical areas and theories intersect, this study refines the classification of theoretical perspectives and contributes to a more critical understanding of the strategic HRM field. Potential implications are discussed to outline actionable recommendations for future research.

Standing acoustic waves in a channel generate time-mean Eulerian flows. In homogeneous fluids, these streaming flows have been shown by Rayleigh to result from viscous attenuation of the waves in oscillatory boundary (i.e. Stokes) layers. However, the strength and structure of the mean flow significantly depart from the predictions of Rayleigh when inhomogeneities in fluid compressibility or density are present. This change in mean flow behaviour is of particular interest in thermal management, as streaming flows can be used to enhance cooling. In this work, we consider standing acoustic wave oscillations of an ideal gas in a differentially heated channel with hot- and cold-wall temperatures respectively set to $T_* + \Delta \varTheta _*$ and $T_*$. An asymptotic analysis for a normalised temperature differential $\Delta \varTheta _*/T_*$ comparable to the small acoustic Mach number is performed to capture the transition between the two documented regimes of Rayleigh streaming ($\Delta \varTheta _*\,{=}\,0$) and baroclinic streaming ($\Delta \varTheta _* =O(T_*)$). Our analytical solution accounts for existing experimental and numerical results and elucidates the separate contributions of viscous torques in Stokes layers and baroclinic forcing in the interior to driving the streaming flow. The analysis yields a scaling estimate for the temperature difference $\Delta \varTheta _{c_*}$ at which baroclinic driving is comparable to viscous forcing, signalling the smooth transition from Rayleigh to baroclinic acoustic streaming.

This paper documents how the advent of the limited liability corporation contributed to the diffusion of steam technology during Sweden’s industrialization. Using longitudinal establishment-level data, we show that incorporation sharply raised the probability that industrial establishments adopted steam. Incorporation facilitated technology adoption partly by enabling smaller establishments to expand to a greater scale, where the use of steam became feasible. These results highlight that low barriers to incorporation may be an important lever for facilitating the diffusion of new technologies.

In the middle of the nineteenth century in cities and towns across North India a popular craze for the sitar drove untold numbers of amateur enthusiasts to seek instruction in Hindustani raga music from the only available source: the Muslim hereditary professional performers known as ustads. A long record of statements excoriating the ustads has generally been dismissed by contemporary scholars as colonially inspired propaganda that served a Hindu identitarian vision of music reform and institution-building for the incipient nation. This article accesses a collection of Urdu-language music instruction texts produced between 1863 and 1915 to offer a contrasting interpretation: the depiction of ustads as ignorant, ill-mannered, and addicted is propounded first and foremost by Muslim authors unconcerned with nationalism, but invested in opening the Hindustani music tradition to the uninitiated amateur. Close readings of narrative anecdotes from these texts alongside the 1910 and 1914 Marathi-language works of famed scholar and music reformer Vishnu Narayan Bhatkhande (1860–1936) reveal a continuity of concerns across language, region, and religious community. Bhatkhande and the earlier Urdu authors share not only their frustration with the half-trained and ill-behaved ‘fly-by-night’ ustad, but also their reverence for the masterful ustads whose reputations were threatened by the unchecked presence of charlatans in their midst.

Only a minority with mental disorders worldwide receive treatment with negligible coverage of interventions to prevent associated impacts, prevent mental disorders or promote mental well-being. Reasons include insufficient public mental health (PMH) skills and training. An electronic search found limited availability of PMH courses globally. Improved access to PMH training informed by a core curriculum will support sustainable reduction of mental disorders, promotion of population mental health well-being and broad associated impacts across sectors. Regular assessment of PMH training coverage and impact will support sustainable progress.

The World of Sugar, Ulbe Bosma’s compelling historical narrative on how sugar became a global commodity, and the accompanying introductory article in the International Review of Social History raise many fascinating points for further reflection and debate. In this commentary, I wish to highlight several points that resonate strongly with my own work at the Transnational Institute (TNI), a global think tank based in Amsterdam that connects social movements with academics and policymakers. These points of reflection are informed by TNI’s mission and practice of “scholar-activism”: the fact that we seek not only to interpret the world, but also to change it for the better, in particular for those exploited and oppressed classes and social groups. As my work principally involves collaboration with transnational agrarian movements, I pay particular attention to areas of Bosma’s analysis that carry implications for rural working people and for agrarian and environmental justice. This includes the role of sugar in the global land rush, the rise of sugar cane as a “flex crop and commodity”, and the ways in which “rural sugars” can be supported in peasant- and smallholder-based economies and livelihood strategies.

This article establishes a foundation for the development of Marxist approaches to European Union (EU) law. While Marxist scholarship has engaged with European integration throughout its history, it has largely overlooked the legal architecture of the EU. Conversely, EU legal studies have remained largely insulated from Marxist thought, even as critical approaches have begun to gain traction. Bridging this mutual neglect, the article argues that EU law must be understood not as a neutral or technocratic system, but as a central element of capitalist social relations both in Europe, and in terms of Europe’s wider integration in the global market. In this way, EU law is bound up with processes of accumulation, imperialism, and racialised social reproduction. Drawing on key currents within Marxist theory, the article situates EU law within the historical dynamics of capitalist development, demonstrating how a materialist legal analysis can deepen and enrich existing critiques of European integration.